Steven Stowell is an historian of late medieval and Early Modern Italian art, whose research focuses on the devotional experiences and ritual uses of Renaissance art, the intersections between art and language, and the relationship between art and cultural discourses on gender and sexuality. He received his doctorate from Oxford University in 2009, and holds a BFA and an MA from Queen's University, Kingston. Prior to joining the faculty of Concordia University, Dr. Stowell held a SSHRC Postdoctoral Fellowship in the Department of Art at the University of Toronto, where he also taught in the Renaissance Studies Program at Victoria College. In his recent book, The Spiritual Language of Art: Medieval Christian Themes in Writings on Art of the Italian Renaissance, Dr. Stowell investigates the relationships between art, literature, and devotional responses to images. He has also published research in the journals Word & Image and Dante Studies. His current research projects explore anthropological approaches to Renaissance art, looking at how art objects were implicated in the discourses surrounding issues such as fertility and growth, chastity and abundance, and healing and nourishment. Dr. Stowell is also a practicing artist, with an interest in figurative representation; he has exhibited in Canada and the UK.

Research & Teaching Interests

Art and Visual Culture in Renaissance Italy

Early Modern European Art (Late Middle Ages to Baroque)

Sacred Art

Early Modern Art Theory

Anthropology and Art History

Histories of Sex and Gender

Distinctions & Awards

2015-2017

SSHRC: Insight Development Grant. "Art, Prayer and Miraculous Growth in Early Renaissance Florence."

Graduate Courses

ARTH 633 Creative and Critical Literature in Art History: Anthropological Approaches to the History of Art
ARTH 610R Selected Issues in North American Art and Architectural History: Early Modern North American Art and the European Tradition
ARTH 610 Counter-Reformation, Conversion andColonization: Early Modern Christian Art in Europe and North America
HAR 70001/ARTH 810-A Problématiques actuelles de l'histoire de l'art/Art history and its methodologies: Art, culture and society: sociological, cultural and anthropological approaches to art history.

Thesis Supervision

I approach the history of art with a broad interest in the contextual histories of art objects. I am also open to several theoretical approaches that illuminate these contexts, including anthropological methodologies, theories of sex and gender, and psychoanalytical theories, amongst others.

As a historian of Early Modern art, specializing in Italian art, I especially welcome topics on European art from the late Middle Ages to the Baroque period, as well as projects interrogating European techniques and traditions in a global context up to the present time. Within this broad geographical and historical framework, I am particularly interested in: histories of sacred art, art theory, the philosophy of art and other writings on art, art and language, art and ritual, and art-making techniques and practices.

Research activities

Current Research

Art, Prayer and Miraculous Growth in Early Renaissance Florence

In recent years there has been a renewed scholarly interest in miracle working images, a phenomenon that was prominent in the Middle Ages andRenaissance. Miracle-working images, often thought to have been created under miraculous circumstances, and usually depicting the Virgin or Christ,were believed capable of perceiving the devotions made to them and miraculously providing aid in times of need. Though for a long time these images were largely neglected by art historians, they are now being recognized as fascinating objects from which we can learn how medieval and Renaissance people related to images, the prayers they offered to them, and the favours and miracles they were believed capable of bestowing. Innovative and foundational research on miraculous images has appeared in recent years, though many questions remain regarding how devotees interacted with these images, as well as how and why it was believed that such images were capable of performing miracles. The scholarly research project, “Art, Prayer and Miraculous Growth in EarlyRenaissance Florence,” focuses on one particular kind of miracle that images were believed capable of offering: the miraculous protection or the safe growth of agricultural products. There are two important cults of miracle-working images in Renaissance Florence that had significant connections to the issue of food production: the cult of Orsanmichele, where a miraculous image was located in what was once a grain market; and the Madonna of Impruneta, an image that was taken on procession in order to stop or encourage the fall of rain. It is only natural that the issue of access to food should emerge in the culture of early Renaissance Florence: reliable sources of food were a primary concern in the growing urban centres, which drew heavily upon the limited resources of the surrounding country side and were extremely vulnerable to famine due to unusual climate fluctuations. This study will examine the rituals associated with these cults to see how they played an important role in ensuring safe access to food. Looking at the sometimes complex ritual devotions performed, for example, at the shrine of Orsanmichele, this project will ask how specific devotional actions ensured specific favours from the miraculous image. This project thus aims fill a gap in our knowledge of the relationship between images, devotion and food, as well as to deepen our understanding of the ways in which medieval and Renaissance people communicated and interacted with devotional images. This material will also connect to larger discussions, taking place across disciplines including anthropology, art history and visual and material culture, regarding the agency of visual art object.

Devotional Art for Chastity and Fertility in Renaissance Italy
This FQRSC-supported project explores the relationship between religion, sexuality and art in late medieval and Renaissance Florence by investigating how art and cult objects were used to encourage and inspire human fertility and chastity, two devotional needs seemingly at odds with one another. It is well known that sacred art encouraged sexual modesty, a central Christian ethic, however, saint's cults and devotional art also responded to prayers for human fertility. This project endeavors to make sense of how and why cult objects were called upon to encourage procreativity while remaining emblems of chastity.

By looking at the context of Renaissance Florence, where devotional practices dependent on visual art flourished, this project illuminates how and why erotic themes arise in works of sacred art, and describes how the visual appearance of these images supported complex devotional needs. Bearing also on the wider theme of anthropological approaches to Renaissance art, this study interrogates dominant interpretations of the agency of works of art by questioning how singular works of art were the object of multiple, sometimes conflicting devotional needs.

Publications

Monographs

The Spiritual Language of Art: Medieval Christian Themes in Writings on Art of the Italian Renaissance. Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2015.

Peer-Review Journal Articles and Book Chapters

"Artistic Devotion: Imitation of Art and Nature in Italian Renaissance Writings on Art." In Inganno - The Art of Deception: Copies and Fakes from the Renaissance to the 18th Century, edited by Sharon Gregory and Sally Hickson, 21-46. Aldershot: Ashgate Press, 2012.

"A Baptism of Drawing: Coming of Age as an Artist in Giorgio Vasari's 'Lives.'" In Rethinking Renaissance Drawings: Essays in Honour of David McTavish, edited by Una Roman D'Elia. Forthcoming in 2015 from McGill-Queen's University Press.

"Early Modern Sacred Art and Sexual Agency: The Language of Fertility and Chastity." In The Performative Image in Early Modernity, edited by Andrew Casper and Christian Kleinbub. Currently in peer-review.

"The Spiritual Meanings of Architecture in the Writings of Giorgio Vasari," Vasari/500, Harvard University, 27-29 October 2012.

"Baptism and Brotherhood: Male Bonding in Images Relating to Baptism and Spiritual Rebirth in Italian Art," Friendship in Premodern Europe, 1300-1700, University of Toronto, 14-15 October 2012.

"Religious Attitudes in Giorgio Vasari's 'Vite': Vasari in the Context of Popular Devotional Literature in Sixteenth-Century Italy," Renaissance Society of America, Montreal, 24-26 March 2011.

Panel organizer and chair: "Sacred and Sexual in Early Modern Italian Art" and "Sacred and Sexual in Early Modern Literature and Biblical Exegesis," Renaissance Society of America, Montreal, 24-26 March 2011.